“In the beginning God created the heaven and the earth. And the earth was without form, and void; and darkness was upon the face of the deep. And the Spirit of God moved upon the face of the waters.” Genesis 1:1-2

INTRODUCTION

There is no doubt in my heart that this post is not going to be accepted by some people, particularly, the liberal theologians and atheists. Nevertheless, I am determined to write this post about the beginning. There is no other authority to which I shall refer except the bible. I believe the bible gives us an accurate account of the creation of the world and the origin of mankind. We shall look at verses 1 and 2 of Genesis chapter 1.

I. THE FIRST VERSE

“In the beginning God created the heaven and the earth.“

There is so much information contained in the first verse of the bible. We are given the foundation and the beginning of the whole visible and invisible universe. These ten words are very important and if they are ignored, anyone attempting to describe the origin of the universe will by all means sound stupid.

Here we are:

a) God

There is no questions to who is the subject of this verse. God is the main character in this verse. It is very interesting that the word for God in Hebrew appears as a plural. The singular for God is ‘El’ but in Genesis 1:1, it is ‘Elohim.’ So it suggest to us that God is more than one person. Moses clarified this in Deuteronomy 6:4 by saying “Hear, O Israel: The Lord our God (Elohim) is one Lord:” God is more than one person but He is one God.

b) In the beginning

We are given the timing of the creation of the whole universe. It happened in the beginning. Some people would ask, “Beginning of what?” Well, this is the beginning of time and also the beginning of God’s work of creation. This is when everything started. I don’t know if there was a bang or it was just deafening silence but whatever it was, it marked the beginning of the whole universe. And God was there before it started.

c) Created

In this single verse we are also told of the action that God took. He created. The word used in the Hebrew language is ‘Bara.’ This particular word can only be used with respects to God. This is because it is only God who created everything out of nothing. He created everything without the use of pre-existing material. None of us can ever create anything at any given time. We can only make things out of materials that already exist, but to create was only pulled off by God alone in the beginning. Therefore God is the sole creator.

d) The heaven and the earth

• The Heavens

This tells us about what God really created. He created not only time (the beginning) but also He created space (heaven) that can be occupied. He created the heavens in their divisions. I am very much convinced that on the very first day the heavens and the host of them were brought forth. The Hebrew word for heavens is שָׁמָ֑יִם “shamayim.” This word is in the plural form and it suggests to us that in the beginning, there existed more than one heaven. It does not matter how many heavens are there, what matters is they did not just pop up by themselves. God created them.

• The Earth

Like the heavens, the earth was also created in the beginning. There shouldn’t be any doubt about the origin of the earth. The earth was created by God and the case rests there. The psalmist sang, “Of old hast thou [God] laid the foundation of the earth:” (Psalm 102:25a). God created the earth and established it. He set it up for his own pleasure. He was pleased to create it. The earth was completely his own idea. It is God alone who could have thought of creating the earth and also to know what to do with it. He had the means and infinite wisdom to create it. No evolutionist, astronomer or even an atheist who can possess enough wisdom and knowledge to successfully contend or do any other thing against the fact that God created it all.

II. THE SECOND VERSE

“And the earth was without form, and void; and darkness was upon the face of the deep. And the Spirit of God moved upon the face of the waters.“

• THE GAP THEORY

This verse has been for centuries a seat for argument among the theologians. There are many views surrounding this verse. With the rise of Darwinian evolution, there has been theologians who came to believe that between verse one and verse two, there are millions, if not billions of years. This idea is called “the gap theory.” There is a suggestion of a pre-Adamic creation, which existed and was destroyed with the earth somewhere between verse one and verse two. As for the author of this post and those who are of like mind, we reject this notion.

• CONTINUATION

It is very clear that verse two is simply the continuation of the first verse. Any intelligent human being can see that the first verse introduces the story of creation by mentioning the earth’s creation in the beginning and then proceeds into the second verse to tell us about the condition of the earth at the moment of it’s creation. If one would continue reading verses 3-31, they would notice that these verses are summarized in verse one. Then in Genesis 2:1-3, the story of the six day creation which was introduced in Genesis 1:1 is concluded. God did not finish the work of creation in verse one and then waited for millions of years to start over in verses 2-31. God started His work of creation on the first day and finished it on the sixth and on the seventh day he stopped creating because He was done. Here is the conclusion statement on creation, “Thus the HEAVENS and the EARTH were FINISHED, and all the host of them.” (Genesis 2:1). This verse tells us that the heavens were created and were completed at the same time as the earth. Exodus 20:11 tells us, “…in six days the Lord made heaven and earth, the sea, and all that in them is, and rested the seventh day:…“

• And the earth was without form and void

Here in this verse we learn that the earth itself in the very beginning was not organized. There was no atmosphere, there was no land but it was a large mass of probably frozen water. There was no life of any sort. The planet was not suitable for any kind of life to thrive there on. There was no sun to give it light and warmth. But God was still at work and six days later the earth would be filled with light, life and beauty.

• And the Spirit of God moved upon the face of the waters.

This is the first mention of the Spirit of God in the Bible. The Holy Spirit was waiting to begin the work of arranging the earth into a life sustaining environment. He moved across the face of the waters, waiting for God’s instruction. God himself worked the earth by the power of his Spirit. He gave it life and beauty and all was pleasant to Him.

CONCLUSION

There is no question that the Bible teaches that God created the heavens and the earth in six days and that He rested from all His work of creation on the seventh day. The first and the second verses of the Bible give us the introductory summary into the six day creation campaign and there was no million or billion year gap between verse one and two. By God’s grace on the next post, we shall look at the events that take place during the six days in verses 3 -31 of Genesis 1.